Sexing the Body: Of Gender and Genitals

Should we, as supposedly responsible adults, “fix” intersexual babies in order to make either male or female? Do surgeons, and even the parents of the child for that matter, have the right to assign an intersex child to a particular sex based upon opinion or societal norms? These questions are just two among many about intersexual births that plague doctors and the medical industry. As Anne Fausto-Sterling explains, “rather than force us to admit the social nature of our ideas about sexual difference, our ever more sophisticated medical technology has allowed us…to insist that people are either naturally male or female.” (Sexing the Body, p. 54) Here, Sterling brings up an increasingly critical point about the relationship between modern medical technology and intersexual births. Every time a surgeon assigns an intersexual child to that child’s allegedly intended gender, that surgeon is unilaterally making numerous decisions that are meant to be made by our society as a whole. That surgeon is perpetuating the traditionalist ideology of a strict two-sex system. And from the support of this idea, stems the continued thought that heterosexuality is inherently normal, and that homosexuality is inherently abnormal. That’s quite an array of complex decisions for a surgeon to be making with the end of a scalpel. However, there is another side to this coin. If surgeons do not assign an intersexual child to a specific gender, then it is entirely possible that the child will be forced to live life as a social outcast and a sexually confused person who feels like a freak that does not belong. The psychological health and development of a child is arguably far too important to leave up to the possibility that an intersexual child will or will not be shown tolerance and acceptance by the outside world.